Aug. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Google Inc. won its bid to overturn
a $30.5 million patent-infringement verdict won by Vringo Inc.,
a reversal that sent the patent licensing firm’s shares down as
much as 79 percent.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in
Washington held Aug. 15 that the Vringo patents in the case were
invalid. Vringo, which reported $1.1 million in revenue last
year, claimed that its filtering technology for determining
advertisement placement in search results was being used in
Google’s AdWords and AdSense for Search products. It won a
November 2012 trial against Google and some of its customers
over infringement of the patents, which had belonged to defunct
search-engine company Lycos.

Google argued that the patents combined well-known
filtering methods without coming up with a new invention.

“We agree and hold that no reasonable jury could conclude
otherwise,” the court said in a 2-1 decision.

The case is I/P Engine Inc. v. AOL Inc., 13-1307, U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (Washington). The
earlier case is I/P Engine Inc. v. AOL Inc., 11cv512, U.S.
District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia (Norfolk).

For more patent news, click here.

Copyright

Jolie Calls Non-Infringement Appeal Unfounded and ‘Emotional’

Actor Angelina Jolie has responded to an appeal of a lower
court ruling that her war film “In the Land of Blood and
Honey” didn’t infringe the copyright of a Croatian journalist.

In a lawsuit he filed in June 2012, James J. Braddock had
claimed Jolie’s film contains “similarities so substantial” to
his Croatian-language book “The Soul Shattering” that his
copyrights were infringed. The court disagreed and in March 2013
dismissed the infringement claims.

Braddock then filed an appeal claiming the court found no
infringement because it wasn’t using a correct translation of
his work from the Croatian language. Jolie filed her response
Aug. 13, saying that Braddock’s “emotional” appeal contained
“virtually no analysis” of the lower court’s infringement
standard.

The lower court case is Braddock. v. Jolie, 2:12-cv-05883-DMG-VBK, U.S. District Court, Central District of California
(Los Angeles). The appeal is James Braddock v. Angeline Jolie,
12-55703, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

For more copyright news, click here.

Trade Secrets/Industrial Espionage

Chinese National Indicted in Boeing Trade-Secret Theft Case

A Chinese national already charged with hacking into Boeing
Co.’s computer system to steal information on military jets was
indicted on additional trade-secret theft and illegal-export
counts as part of a U.S. investigation into industrial espionage
by China.

Su Bin, 49, owner of a Chinese aviation technology company
with an office in Canada, conspired with two unidentified
individuals in China staring in 2008 and continuing until as
recently as May to hack into computers, download defense-related
trade secrets and export data on military jets, according to an
Aug. 14 indictment in Santa Ana, California.

Su is in custody in British Columbia, Canada, where he is
being held under a provisional arrest warrant submitted by the
U.S., prosecutors said in an Aug. 15 statement.

Su’s alleged co-conspirators claimed to have stolen 65
gigabytes of data from Boeing related to the C-17 military cargo
plane, according to a criminal complaint filed in June. They
also allegedly sought data related to other aircraft, including
Lockheed Martin Corp.’s F-22 and F-35 fighter jets.

Su owns an aviation technology company called Lode-Tech and
is in contact with Chinese military and commercial aerospace
entities, according to the complaint. The two unidentified
Chinese individuals are “affiliated with multiple organizations
and entities” in China, according to U.S. prosecutors.

The case is U.S. v. Su Bin, 8:14-cr-00131, U.S. District
Court, Central District of California (Sana Ana).

Ex-MediaTek Worker Questioned, Released in Trade Secret Probe

Taiwan prosecutors questioned and then released on bail a
former employee of MediaTek Inc., a semiconductor company based
in Hsinchu, Taiwan, the WantChina Times news website reported.

Mediatek had filed a report with Taiwan’s Criminal
Investigation Bureau claiming 10 of its ex-employees took the
company’s trade secrets with them when they left the company for
new jobs, according to WantChina Times.

Eight other ex-employees have also been questioned in
connection with the alleged theft, WantChina Times reported.

Trademarks

Cognizant Awarded Attorney Fees in McAfee Trademark Suit

Internet entrepreneur John McAfee was ordered to pay
$130,341 attorney fees in a trademark infringement case brought
by Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp., a business and software
consulting firm.

Cognizant sued in March, claiming McAfee was offering an
application for mobile devices and tablets named Cognizant.

McAfee is the founder of McAfee Associates, creator of
anti-virus software. That company was acquired by Intel Corp. in
2010 and has since been rebranded.

According to the fee-award order, Teaneck, New Jersey-based
Cognizant made repeated efforts to serve McAfee with the
complaint and he failed to appear in court. In June, the court
issued a default judgment against him.

Cognizant sought attorney fees and costs of $158,678. U.S.
District Judge William Orrick cut that award to $124,906 and
$5,435 in costs. He said Cognizant’s counsel did good work and
achieved desired results, and the premium rates they charged
were “justified by their education, experience and the quality
of work performed.”

He made cuts because some of the requests failed to
describe the work performed and because some of the work done by
partners could have been handled by a junior attorney or non-attorney.

The case is Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp. v. McAfee,
14-cv-01146, U.S. District Court, Northern District of
California (San Francisco).